Black Tea And A Vanilla Muffin For Barack Obama

IN this post-racial Age of Obama (can we have a term for it?) Detroit hack Kristen Browning-Blas writes from the world’s first green city of how change is yet to happen.

The hyphen hears of a Colorado woman who made a stand. She shall overcome:

After watching the swearing-in on TV, I hauled myself to the gym, thinking I’d march on the Stairmaster along with the parade. Our gym has a cafe/bar, and I stopped to have some soup first.

Can’t march on an empty stomach. Not even the soup Nazis.

One of the employees was checking the tea and noted out loud that they were out of black tea. To the other server, she made a joke about ordering some more “Obama tea.”

Obama tea? Is he detoxing, his body linked to the State. Obama tea…?

On this day, of all days, I could not turn away, pretend I didn’t hear.My pulse raced a little. Butterflies fluttered in my stomach. In the larger scheme of things, calling her on it was a small act.

A person of color might say, “that’s nothing compared to the things people have said to me.” But to pretend I hadn’t heard, when indeed I had, as the televisions above the bar showed images of President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama, walking the parade route, was unthinkable.

Get me a frothy capuccino. Go on…

I did the uncomfortable thing and spoke to the server (the jokester had disappeared), and to the club manager. “What do you want me to do?” the manager asked, when I said I thought it was not a harmless joke but a racist statement. I suggested racial sensitivity training at the very least. He said he would “take it under advisement.” I found out later he spoke to her about the incident.

Phew! Thank f*** she didn’t order a muffin…

Political Punch: Obama Jokes Washington Needs to Toughen Up …
Obama, The Mirror - John Hood - The Corner on National Review Online
The Hill Blog» Blog Archive » Obama Visits GOP

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Posted: 28th, January 2009 | In: Politicians Comment | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink